WE COMMEMORATED the anniversary of Mahatma Gandhi’s assassination on January 30, 1948, at the hands of Nathuram Godse.
I think we should remember the day in the spirit of Gandhi. He imagined death as a kind of victory.
“Heroes”, he believed, “are made in the hour of defeat. Success is well described as a series of glorious defeats”.
The framework of non-violence places emphasis on the mode of dying: “History is replete with instances of men, who, by dying with courage and compassion on their lips, converted the hearts of their violent opponents”.
In the context of partition, and its long-range consequences, Gandhi predicted that “only my death will determine whether I am ‘Mahomed Gandhi’ (ie,a defector from Hinduism), Jinnah’s slave (ie, an accomplice
